zekiah by all who
were ceremonially clean, whereas the opposite holds good, immediately
afterwards, in the great passover of Josiah (2 Chron. xxx. 17, xxxv.
11).

It is impossible that this incongruity could be devised, for the sake of
plausibility, in a narrative which rested on no solid basis. It goes far
to establish what has been so anxiously denied--the reality of the
centralised worship in the time of Hezekiah. And it also establishes the
great doctrine that priesthood was held not by a superior caste, but on
behalf of the whole nation, in whom it was theoretically vested, and for
whom the priest acted, so that they were "a nation of priests."

(Ver. 8.) The use of unleavened bread is distinctly said to be in
commemoration of their haste--"for thou camest out of Egypt in haste"
(Deut. xvi. 3)--but it does not follow that they were forced by haste to
eat their bread unleavened at the first. It was quite as easy to prepare
leavened bread as to provide the paschal lamb four days previously.

We may therefore seek for some further explanation, and this we find in
the same verse in Deuteronomy, in the expression "bread of affliction."
They were to receive the meat of passover with a reproachful sense of
their unworthiness: humbly, with bread of affliction and with bitter
herbs.

Moreover, we learn from St. Paul that unleavened bread represents
simplicity and truth; and our Lord spoke of the leaven of the Pharisees
and of Herod (Mark viii. 15). And this is not only because leaven was
supposed to be of the same nature as corruption. We ourselves always
mean something unworthy when we speak of _mixed_ motives, possible
though it be to act from two motives, both of them high-minded. Now,
leaven represents mixture in its most subtle and penetrating form.

The paschal feast did not express any such luxurious and sentimental
religionism as finds in the story of the cross an easy joy, or even a
delicate and pleasing stimulus for the softer emotions, "a very lovely
song of one that hath a pleasant voice, and playeth well on an
instrument." No, it has vigour and nourishment for those who truly
hunger, but its bread is unfermented, and it must be eaten with bitter
herbs.

(Ver. 9.) Many Jewish sacrifices were "sodden," but this had to be roast
with fire. It may have been to represent suffering that this was
enjoined. But it comes to us along with a command to consume all the
flesh, reserving none and rejecting none. Now, t